You’re a working mom. You get up early to help get the kids ready. And then you get in your car (and, possibly, fill it up with $4-a-gallon gas) and head out to do battle in the business world.

You have a frontline view of what it’s like to be a working mom in California. And according to a new survey by personal-finance site WalletHub, that view is not nearly as sunny as anyone could hope.

WalletHub said Tuesday that its survey’s results ranked California in 40th place among the 50 states and the District of Columbia for best and worst states for working moms. The survey looked at 16 different metrics under three main categories — child care, professional opportunities, and work-life balance — and ranked everything on a scale of zero to 100 points.

(If thinking that you are in the 40th-best state for working moms isn’t depressing enough, look at it from another angle: You also live in the 12th-worst state for working moms.)

WalletHub said its survey results were based on its own research, as well as data from agencies such as the U.S. Census Bureau and the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

And when it comes to California, the state sure doesn’t make it easy for working moms to get through the day.

Take childcare. If you have kids, you are certainly well aware of how getting decent childcare, and the costs associated with it, can be astonishing. But how astonishing is the state of childcare in California?

Are you sitting down?

WalletHub’s findings placed California in 49th place for childcare quality (Yay! We beat Nebraska and Idaho!) and in 44th place for childcare costs, when those costs are adjusted for the median women’s annual salary.

Oh, and about that median women’s annual salary? When that is adjusted for the cost of living, California ranks next to last, at No. 50. California also ranks in the bottom half of all states and the District of Columbia in terms of the ratio of female executives to male executives, by coming in 30th place in that category.

So, did WalletHub find any good news for California’s working moms? It might be too much to say there were any real “bright spots,” but the study did give California better marks for items such as gender pay gap — women’s earnings as a percentage of men’s — where California came in 15th place. For the average length of women’s workdays, in hours, California came in 17th place. And the state ranked No. 18 for single-mother families under the poverty line.

Rex Crum is the senior web editor for the business section for The Mercury News and Bay Area News Group. He also writes about business and technology for the publications' print and web editions, and has covered business and technology for nearly two decades. A native of Seattle, he remains a diehard Seahawks and Mariners fan and is imparting his fandom to his Oakland-native wife and two young daughters.

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